A mailing list in full use with decent auto-responders is a joy to see and literally poetry in motion. If your not sure what an auto-responder is, be sure to check out the link at the bottom of this article.

How would you like to sell a product to a customer and then market more of your products to that same customer in the future automatically without having to do anything (apart from setting up a process one time only?

Interested? Mailing lists are big business, and lots of businesses fail to see just how important capturing a customers email address can be.

Even if you do not have your own product i.e. if you are an affiliate marketer for other peoples products I am going to try to convince you of the importance of a mailing list you can use to market over and over to customers.

Logically, it makes sense to sell to existing customers doesn”t it? You have bought this existing customer to your website in the past and hopefully because you gave outstanding service and the product they purchased exceeded their expectations, they will be much more receptive to you for any new products you offer in the future.

Having the customer (or even potential customers) on a mailing list makes sense doesn”t it? It’’s a great way to keep in touch and to keep your name in their Inbox (hopefully for good reasons!) and is a great way to convert potential buyers into customers and existing customers in repeat-business customers.

It all starts with the mailing list. It’’s very important to capture the visitors name and email address when they get to your website, so that you have an opportunity to build a relationship with them in the future.

So how do you go about that? Remember, many people are reluctant to give out thier email address to just anyone, because we all hate spam, and you have to have built up a level of rapport before people are comfortable giving you their email address. It’’s a catch- 22 situation isn”t it?

Well two things will help here, firstly the quality of the information on your website will be a real plus. Relevant quality content will show the visitor that this is not a dodgy website, but rather a real website run by a real person.

Having a privacy policy and real contact information including phone numbers is also very important and helps in showing your customer that you are a real living person.

With all that said, many potential customers would still be reluctant to give you their email address, so you have to give out an incentive, a reason for them to give you their email address.

When considering finding out more about email mailing lists; it pays to do a little research first as a smart way to move forward faster!

This is where a useful report, a useful e-Book, or other information can come in handy. Tell the visitor if they sign up to your mailing list, they get access to the report, or whatever it is that you are offering free of charge. If you have not got anything else to give away, think outside the square.

What about offering a coupon to be used to claim a discount when ordering, or some other benefit.

People get the opportunity to discover more about you, your products and services with auto-responders. Often it may take five or more pieces of “content” before someone feels comfortable enough to purchase something from you.

I have purchased a lot (and when I say a lot the emphasis is on the words a lot) of e-Books in my time, and the quality of a fair portion of them was sub-average at best.

In many cases I would not have bothered to purchased the e-Book if I had read some of it first, but on the other hand there are some purchases I have not made because I wasn”t sure what to expect quality wise, and being able to read a few chapters might just have swayed me to purchase the book).

The thing to remember with free giveaways is to make sure it’’s a quality product and relevant to your site. If your freebie turns out to be useless to your subscriber and not of value, they are going to unsubscribe faster than you can say “oops I blew it”.

Speaking of un-subscribing, it’’s also very important for the visitor to know they can un-subscribe anytime without penalty, so make sure you make this clear on the sign up/opt-in page, and then ensure you actually do unsubscribe them if you receive a request to do so.

Auto-responders truly are the bee’’s knee’’s (Aussie slang for perfect).

Automating things is one of the first steps to achieving truly great things, and an auto-responder is a great thing to use to automate your customer or potential customer follow-up.

Read my auto-responder Article for specific techniques on how to follow up customers and some of the rules of the game.

Lots of companies providing mailing list and auto-responder automation. If you do any research you will find that AWeber is generally acknowledged to be one of the best, and I use them exclusively.

If your in the market for this type of automation, I suggest you check them out.

One of the great things they offer a full no risk30 day and even a free trial. Mailing lists can be one of the most effective ways to ramp up traffic to your website by getting prospects or customers coming back time and time again.

Mailing Lists Are Something you should look into in your quest for more web site traffic.

For the latest information on email lists, please visit Anthony & Tim today. Their detailed and helpful information and free online web traffic courses will help you begin dramatically building your online business to reach your goals.